Biblical scholar Joseph Atwill has allegedly discovered historical documents that prove conclusively that the life and ministry of Jesus Christ (Yeshua) was based not only on many deities and events that predated his supposed existence, but also that of Roman Emperor Titus Flavius.

As I wrote in a 2011 article for Huffington Post, many people are familiar with the Winter Solstice. For those who are not, it’s when the sun reaches it’s lowest point in the sky on Dec. 21, appearing to stop moving for three days, then rising again on Dec. 25. It is commonly accepted that the “Birth of the Son” was appropriated from the “Return of the Sun.” The three wise men are believed to be based on the three stars of Orion’s Belt — also referred to as “The Three Kings” — and astronomy tells us that they appear to follow the bright star, Sirius, who over the years has evolved into Mary, the Virgin Mother.

Besides the fact that December 25 is relevant to a long list of deities throughout antiquity who pre-date Jesus, from Persia’s pagan Sun GodMithra to Egypt’s Horus and Ra, to Syria’s Baal, Rome’s Sol Invictus and Greece’s Helios, it wasn’t until the year 350 A.D., that Pope Julius I declared that the “Christ-Mass” would be held on Dec. 25, to celebrate the birth of Jesus Christ.

Though Biblical scholars have debated that the declared celebration is not his actual birthday, the argument that Jesus himself is a myth has been dismissed as nothing short of incendiary conspiracy theory.

Atwill claims that he now has concrete proof that Jesus was conceived as a manipulation device to subdue the Jewish masses and engender fidelity to the Roman empire.

Atwill asserts that Christianity did not really begin as a religion, but a sophisticated government project, a kind of propaganda exercise used to pacify the subjects of the Roman Empire. “Jewish sects in Palestine at the time, who were waiting for a prophesied warrior Messiah, were a constant source of violent insurrection during the first century,” he explains. “When the Romans had exhausted conventional means of quashing rebellion, they switched to psychological warfare. They surmised that the way to stop the spread of zealous Jewish missionary activity was to create a competing belief system. That’s when the ‘peaceful’ Messiah story was invented. Instead of inspiring warfare, this Messiah urged turn-the-other-cheek pacifism and encouraged Jews to ‘give onto Caesar’ and pay their taxes to Rome.”

Was Jesus based on a real person from history? “The short answer is no,” Atwill insists, “in fact he may be the only fictional character in literature whose entire life story can be traced to other sources. Once those sources are all laid bare, there’s simply nothing left.”

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Is this the beginning of the end of Christianity? “Probably not,” grants Atwill, “but what my work has done is give permission to many of those ready to leave the religion to make a clean break. We’ve got the evidence now to show exactly where the story of Jesus came from. Although Christianity can be a comfort to some, it can also be very damaging and repressive, an insidious form of mind control that has led to blind acceptance of serfdom, poverty, and war throughout history. To this day, especially in the United States, it is used to create support for war in the Middle East.”

[Editor’s Note: This article is not a personal endorsement of Atwill’s findings, rather it is a report on his upcoming presentation. To read a a comprehensive counter-argument to Atwill’s claims, I suggest Richard Carrier’s blog. Click here. — kws]